Understanding and Overcoming Allostatic Overload: Navigating Stress for a Healthier Life

Craig 00:01 

Are you constantly anxious, tired, irritable and just feeling on edge? If so, it may not be in your head, you may be feeling the effects of chronic stress that leads to psychological and physiological overload. But what if I told you there's a hidden mechanism behind this, known as allostatic overload? Listen on as I talk about stress, allostatic overload and what you can do about it.

Welcome to Live Well and Flourish, where I help you understand what it means to live a flourishing life. I'm your host, Craig Van Slyke. If you're ready to think beyond material and external success, if you're ready to take control of who you are and the kind of life you live, if you're ready to flourish, this is the podcast for you.

Craig 00:57 

Picture this. You have a stopped-up sink with a steadily dripping faucet. At first, the sink can easily contain the water from the drips but eventually, over time, the sink fills up and overflows. You can bail out the sink to clear some of the water, but if you don’t stop the drip or fix the clog, your sink will overflow again and again, in a never-ending cycle. To truly fix the problem, you have to identify and correct the underlying causes. The stress overloads your system and you metaphorically overflow. There’s actually a term for what’s going on -- allostatic overload. This kind of strange term describes an important concept, one that can help you understand the sometimes devastating effects of stress. The principle behind allostatic overload is really pretty simple once you understand the underlying concept of allostatic load, which is the cumulative effect of stress on your body. 

Craig 01:59 

Your body is constantly adapting to the effects of ever shifting demands. The allostatic system is how your body maintains stability under these dynamic conditions. But your body can only handle so much. Allostatic load reflects the amount of effort and resources your body needs to expend in order to maintain stability. Sometimes, this load is more than the body can handle and allostatic overload results. 

The potential consequences from allostatic overload is troubling:

- cardiovascular disease, 

- diabetes, 

- obesity, 

- depression, 

- Anxiety,

- Fatigue, and

- cognitive impairment

Two additional consequences of allostatic overload lead to a downward spiral of negative effects. Allostatic overload makes you more sensitive to new stressors. Making matters worse, it also reduces your ability to cope with stress, which can magnify the impacts of what might otherwise be minor stressors. When stress overloads your system, things get worse and worse until you find some ways to either reduce the underlying causes (the stressors) or better cope with the stress. Unfortunately both of these are easy to say, but not always easy to do. The good news is that there are things you can do that will help. Even small steps can make a big difference.

Craig 03:24 

By the way, I did a mini-series of episodes on stress in episodes 64 through 70. They’re all available at livewellandflourish.com. You can get started by going to livewellandflourish.com/64. That episode discusses what I call the stress trifecta, uncertainty, isolation, and overload.

Let’s take a closer look at the relationship between allostatic load and stress. Anytime you experience stress, your body has to adapt to cope with that stress. This happens constantly everyday. Most of the time we don’t even notice the effects of allostatic load. It’s all automatic and unconscious. Let's look at an example. Picture this, you’re on your morning commute and traffic is heavy. Suddenly you see unexpected brake lights just ahead of you. This moment of stress makes your pulse rate jump up and your temperature rise as your foot goes quickly for the brake pedal. If this happens once, you recover pretty quickly and go back to normal. But, if this happens over and over as you make your way to work, you start to feel stressed out and irritable. This has happened to all of us, I'm pretty sure. Well, when this happens you’ve just experienced the effects of allostatic load.

Craig 04:46 

Your body sheds the effects of most stressors quickly and easily. But that’s not always the case. To better understand this, it’s helpful to distinguish between episodic stress and chronic stress. Most stress is momentary and fleeting. It occurs, we cope with it and it goes away when the underlying cause is no longer present. When the traffic clears and moves along normally, the stress from the sudden brake lights goes away. We’re all subjected to episodic stressors throughout the day. Rushing to get to a meeting, realizing that you’re out of milk at breakfast (or worse, you’re out of coffee!), a tight deadline that looms on the horizon … these are all temporary, although some, like the deadline, are worse than others. The important point here is that the stress goes away when the cause goes away.

Chronic stress is different, and much worse in many ways. The key to understanding why is knowing that the underlying causes of chronic stress are, well, chronic. Episodic stressors are temporary; they go away. Not the case with chronic stress. Because of this, you have to deal with chronic stress constantly. It just doesn’t end. This, of course, can take a huge toll on your mental and physical well-being. 

Craig 06:04 

What are some causes of chronic stress? Well, here are a few:

- Financial hardship, especially if that hardship threatens your ability to meet basic needs

- Being in dysfunctional relationships

- Chronic illness

- Caretaking for someone with chronic illness

- Toxic or high-pressure work environments

- Living in an unsafe area,

- Perfectionism (bet you didn’t expect that one!),

- Unresolved trauma, and 

- Ongoing negative self-talk.

The list could go on and on. Making this worse is the fact that chronic stressors can interact with each other, compounding their effects. All of the stressors you experience require more and more mental and physical resources until you become overloaded. In many ways, it’s a bleak picture, but there is hope and I’m here to help. 

Craig 06:57 

What can you do about allostatic overload when your system just gets overwhelmed when trying to deal with everything? Well, much like unclogging the sink and fixing the drip, you have to address the underlying causes of the stress that lead to the overload. My approach to dealing with allostatic overload and stress has two parts: Taking control and getting support.

To deal with allostatic overload you have to do something about the underlying causes. You have to take control. I’ve talked about the importance of taking control of your life throughout the this podcast. Taking control to me is the single best thing you can do for your well-being and your flourishing. Even taking some small steps to take control of the underlying causes of stress can do wonders.

Let’s look at one example, one that’s all too common, chronic financial stress. Worrying about money can be terribly stressful. Before going forward, I do want to recognize that some aspects of financial stress are beyond your control, but for many of us, there are things that we can control. Sometimes these are small. Using coupons to save a bit of money here and there, stopping to ask yourself if you really need to buy that whatever it is you're thinking about buying, creating a budget, there are a lot of things you can do to take SOME control over financial stress. 

Craig 08:25 

By the way, if you’re experiencing stress due to your financial situation, I strongly suggest checking out Ralph Estep’s excellent podcast, the Ask Ralph Podcast. His daily podcast is a wealth of information on taking control of your financial health. You can check it out at https://www.askralphpodcast.com/.

Another way to reduce chronic stress is to take control of your physical health. For most of us, even some small changes can make meaningful differences in your health. Do not discount the effects of small changes. I talked about how small things can lead to big results in episode 29. Yeah, you guessed it, It’s available at livewellandflourish.com/29. You can start walking a few minutes each day. You can skip the desert from time to time. You can go to bed a little earlier. Even if it takes some time to feel the physical effects of these changes, the simple fact that you’re taking control should reduce some of the chronic stress you might be feeling.

Craig 09:30 

But how can you figure out what aspects of your life you should try to control, what's causing the stress? That brings us back to the importance of understanding the underlying causes. Figuring out the root causes of your stress takes some work, but it’s work that pays off both immediately and in the long run. The immediate payoff comes from knowing that you’re taking control by taking the first step in the journey towards dealing with your stress. Longer term, knowing the causes of the stress helps you unclog the sink and fix the drip so that your stress doesn’t continue to overflow again and again.

I’ll talk more about identifying the causes of your stress later. But for now, let’s switch gears to the importance of getting support. I’m going to talk about two forms of support, both of which can help you reduce the effects of stress even if you can’t eliminate the causes. The first is social support. My guess is that if you’re taking the time to listen to a podcast on flourishing, you’re probably a good person who has done many good things for others. You won’t hesitate to help someone in need, so don’t hesitate to ask for help when YOU need it. Even something as simple as having someone listen to your troubles can help reduce the effects of stress. Just being around supportive others can make a big difference by reducing feelings of social isolation, which is a major cause of stress. 

Craig 10:58 

Sometimes tapping into your personal social network isn’t enough though, you need the help of a mental health professional. These folks are trained to help you identify the causes of your stress and can also help you find ways to cope. A good way to find a reliable mental health professional is to talk with your primary care doctor. They can also help you deal with health-related causes of stress. Don’t be afraid to ask for a referral to a psychologist, psychiatrist, or therapist. Many areas also have community mental health centers and there are also support groups that might be of assistance. If you have trouble finding resources, use the contact form at livewellandflourish.com and I’ll do what I can to help you track down some useful resources.

Before getting into what you can do this week to alleviate chronic stress, I want to caution you that too much episodic, temporary stress can also be a huge problem. Lots of temporary stress can quickly overload your system, leading to some of the same effects as chronic stress. So, don’t ignore seemingly small, temporary stressful situations. Remember lots of small things can quickly add up to overwhelm your ability to cope.

Craig 12:13 

Alright. Let’s look at three things you can do this week to help you deal with the consequences of stress overload. I’m going to give you one practice that will help with taking control, one that will help with getting support, and one that can help you temporarily deal with stressful situations.

My first recommendation is to do some stress journaling. Stress journaling involves a periodic practice (daily is best) in which you reflect on and record your thoughts and feelings related to stress. Think back through your day and recall times you felt stressed. Write down two things: the details of the situation and how you felt and reacted (is that two things or three things? Doesn't matter). That’s all you have to do for the daily practice. If you’re already journaling, expand your reflections to include stress. Once a week, go back through the entries to see if you can identify patterns. For example, do you often feel stressed at work or when paying bills? These patterns can help you identify the underlying causes of your stress so that you can start to take control by taking steps to reduce the underlying stressors. 

Craig 13:26 

You might find it useful to record the stressful situations throughout the day by making a simple note so that you don’t forget the event. The key outcome here is to identify the stressors so that you can start to take control. A bonus of stress journaling is that sometimes the act of journaling can help reduce the stress.

My second recommendation is to build and strengthen your support network. The best antidote for stress is understanding friends. So, one of the best things you can do to reduce the effects of stress is to build, strengthen, and use your personal support network. To me, one excellent way to build and strengthen your support network is to take concrete actions to stay in touch with friends, and to support them whenever you can. Remember to have a friend, be a friend. 

Craig 14:18 

One exercise that can help here is to write down 5 people to whom you can turn when you need support. Then, make it a point to contact each of them in the coming week, just to check in and see how they’re doing. The next week, do this with a set of 5 different friends. Do this for a month, then repeat the process with those 20 friends every month. Essentially, you’re making sure you stay in touch with these friends by connecting with them at least once a month. By the way, 5 is a pretty arbitrary number. Use whatever number works for you. Your goals here are to strengthen your connections with these folks, and also to be available to them if they need help. Remember, plant the seeds before you need the garden … or something like that. You’re trying to make authentic, deep connections with these friends and then to maintain those connections. Invest the effort and, over time, you’ll have twenty good friends in your support network. 

Craig 15:21 

My final suggestion relates to dealing with the immediate effects of stress. In my experience, nothing is better at relieving stress than deep breathing. This is a pretty simple, but highly effective practice that you can use virtually any time and any place. Take deep, slow, steady breaths through your nose, and slowly exhale through your mouth. If it’s safe to do so, close your eyes and that should strengthen the effect. I find that five or six deep breaths is often enough to calm me down and lower my heart rate. Keep in mind that these effects are temporary, like bailing out the sink. You still need to address the underlying causes or the stress will return. 

Craig 16:09 

To close, I’m going to recycle a quote I’ve used before (At least I think I've used it before). It’s apt (apt is such a fun word) and I like it, so I’m going to use it again. It’s from pioneering psychologist William James. "The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another."  

Until next time, take a deep breath my friends.

I produce Live Well and Flourish because of my dedication to helping others live excellent lives. I don't accept sponsorships and I don't want your money. The only thing I want is to help you and others flourish. If you've received some value from this episode, please share it with someone that might also benefit from listening. The best way to do that is to direct them to livewellandflourish.com

Until next time.